Connecticut’s utility regulator has denied a petition from the state attorney general and consumer counsel asking it to overturn its approval of the $2.35 billion sale of Aquarion Water Co. to a newly created public authority, dismissing claims that a math error tainted the decision. The Public Utilities Regulatory Authority issued its ruling Thursday morning, […]
Connecticut’s utility regulator has denied a petition from the state attorney general and consumer counsel asking it to overturn its approval of the $2.35 billion sale of Aquarion Water Co. to a newly created public authority, dismissing claims that a math error tainted the decision.
The Public Utilities Regulatory Authority issued its ruling Thursday morning, rebuffing arguments from Attorney General William Tong and Consumer Counsel Claire Coleman that the agency had overlooked nearly half a billion dollars in ratepayer costs
when it approved the deal in March.
The two officials filed the joint petition April 8, arguing that PURA miscounted future rate increases by $474 million because it failed to fully expand a compressed Excel spreadsheet submitted as evidence.
PURA called the allegation overblown. The purported error, the agency wrote, withers under basic scrutiny, saying the underlying financial models all produced identical revenue projections regardless of how their columns were formatted.
Each spreadsheet, the agency said, showed cumulative revenues of $959.5 million by 2065, meaning no rate increase data was actually hidden or overlooked. The agency also noted that neither the attorney general nor the consumer counsel raised the alleged error when they filed written exceptions to an earlier version of the decision, and that the same table had appeared in a prior ruling that the petitioners had reviewed.
PURA was also direct in its frustration with how Tong’s office characterized the claim publicly, noting that the petitioners had taken to social media to trumpet a bombshell math error before the agency had a chance to respond. That kind of rhetoric, the agency wrote, strikes at PURA’s competency and integrity and risks reputational harm to the agency and its staff.
The petition also argued that one of PURA’s approval conditions improperly overrode a legislative mandate. The condition required the new Aquarion Water Authority to seek board approval for capital projects exceeding $2 million — lower than the $3.5 million threshold set by the General Assembly.
Tong and Coleman argued the agency was rewriting the statute, citing a
Superior Court ruling from January that had faulted PURA for disregarding legislative intent in an earlier phase of the proceeding.
PURA disagreed, saying the January ruling addressed a different question entirely and that nothing stopped the agency from imposing conditions that go beyond what state law requires, particularly when the applicants had voluntarily agreed to the stricter standard as a transition-period consumer protection.
The agency also declined to revisit due process objections related to a settlement offer the applicants submitted after the evidentiary record had closed, saying those arguments had already been addressed and that the petition raised nothing new.
Closing with a pointed rebuke, PURA said it “appreciates robust advocacy, but there is a limit.”
The ruling was signed by PURA Vice Chairman David Arconti Jr. and Commissioners Janice Beecher and Holly Cheeseman. Chairman Thomas Wiehl had recused himself from the proceeding.
Aquarion Water Authority and Aquarion Water Co., in a joint statement, called PURA's decision "a meaningful step in the regulatory process."
"We are continuing to take the necessary steps to close this transaction," they said.
